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It has been awhile since I’ve written here – nearly 5 years. Yikes! Life happens! I’m happy to report that all is well and I’m really enjoying working with the Cleveland Clinic Akron General team as Program Director, Continuous Improvement.

I wanted to inform you that I will be a guest on the Institute for Enterprise Excellence webinar this Friday, January 25 from 1:00 – 2:00 p.m. EST.

I will be sharing my thoughts on a concept I call “Functional Management – The Organization as Patient”. Click here for a brief synopsis and links to the webinar.

Join me on Friday and then let’s continue the discussion. Your feedback and thoughts are most welcomed!

You may have heard about THE University of Dayton’s bracket busting tour through the NCAA Men’s Division 1 Basketball tournament and perhaps have seen the pictures of their President, Dr. Dan Curran crowd-surfing with the celebrating students in the streets surrounding the university. Perhaps a little background is necessary in order to understand the link of March Madness and Operational Excellence at UD.

My wife and I are in the small percentage of people who picked the University of Dayton to proceed to the sweet sixteen in the NCAA basketball tournament. Dayton, once considered a “bubble” team, (one that may not make the final cut of 64 teams) was seeded 11th in the South region and faces one of the toughest paths to the finals.

Their first game was against interstate foe, The Ohio State University Buckeyes. I can’t call this a rivalry game because of Ohio State’s policy of not scheduling games against in-state schools. The state of Ohio has had it’s share of talented basketball schools – Cincinnati, Xavier, Kent State and Dayton who have all participated in recent NCAA tournaments and have had some success. Even my alma mater, Cleveland State University made a trip to the sweet sixteen back in 1986, while I was earning my MBA, there. For some reason, Ohio State will not schedule a regular season game with another in-state school.

Ohio State has represented the cream of the crop when it comes to NCAA Division 1 basketball in Ohio. We’ve always rooted for the Buckeyes, because of their success and our loyalty to the state of Ohio.

So when the brackets were announced last week, my son, Noah, a freshman at UD was a little torn. After all, we had taught him that you should be loyal to Ohio State and he had grown up always rooting for them. Ohio State started as his first choice of schools to attend for his Engineering undergraduate degree – until we visited both Ohio State and Dayton. Dayton was always a close second due to his older sister having graduated from UD in 2009. After visiting both schools last year, Dayton won his heart and his mind. So when he texted us with the question, “Who am I supposed to root for in the first round?” He may have been thinking more about the Billion Dollar challenge than he was about school loyalty. He later texted, “I want Dayton to win, but I’ve always rooted for OSU. It’s so conflicting, haha”. We helped him make a quick adjustment in his thinking and he, my wife and I filled out our brackets with Dayton beating Ohio State and they did!

Next up, Syracuse, a team that at one time during this season was ranked number 1, having won their first 25 games of the season. Logically, Syracuse should end Dayton’s run in the tournament. It would be silly to pick Dayton, as the experts only gave them a 3.5% chance of making it to the Sweet Sixteen round. We picked them anyway and Dayton won.

Their victory set off a celebration in the streets around the campus, which brings me to my link between the NCAA tournament known as March Madness and Operational Excellence on display at UD.

The President of the University goes to gemba. Not only in the classroom, but he takes to the streets.

That’s right, University of Dayton president, Dr. Daniel Curran, instead of sitting at home and watching news coverage of the celebration, decided it would be best for him to be a part of it. He was not afraid to interact with the celebrating students. It looks like his presence was appreciated by the students, as they could be heard cheering, “Dr. Dan, Dr. Dan, Dr. Dan!”

This represents what many organizations are lacking when it comes to implementing a lean culture. Their leaders don’t want to go the gemba, where the work is done. They would rather look at reports on their computer screens and rely on their managers to go see what is going on. This is what keeps front-line caregivers and associates distanced from their leaders.

We’ve been to Dayton and have met and shook hands with Dr. Curran. He was at the freshman orientation pep rally and opening Mass this fall when my son started his college journey. My wife and I watched from the stands as Dr. Curran interacted with the students. When he spoke later about genuinely being interested in the success of the students, we believed him because we had seen the way he interacted with them.

Mark also hosted a podcast with Paul Piechota, Director for the Center for Competitive Change at the University of Dayton School of Engineering. You can listen to the podcast at www.leanblog.org/194

In the podcast, Paul talks about the support from Dr. Curran and how they have adapted lean as a business strategy. Dr. Curran’s leadership is a constant message throughout the podcast.

UD’s quest to achieve operational excellence is not a tool-based approach, rather, it is grounded in guiding principles, starting with their roots as a Marianist university.

We had an opportunity to experience another principal of operational excellence (Respect for Every Individual) at UD recently when our son, Noah, called my wife in the morning a few weeks ago complaining of severe abdominal pain. His roommate had left for the day and there was no one around in his dorm for him to contact. He was lying on his dorm room floor writhing in pain. My wife called 911, who contacted University student services. An ambulance transported Noah to the local hospital where it was discovered that Noah was passing a small kidney stone. He was given some pain-killing medication and was given a ride back to his dorm where we met him after driving the 3.5 hours to ensure everything was ok. He is ok now, but it was a scary morning for him and for us.

While we were driving to Dayton, we received a call from Student Services checking to see that everything was ok and offering us housing for the evening if we wanted it. It is a service that they offer to all parents whose kids require medical attention. We assured them that Noah was ok and that we would not be staying the night, however, we were extremely pleased and thankful for the personal interest in both Noah’s and our well-being.

We were excited to see Dayton students and Dr. Curran celebrating their success by dancing in the streets last night. They will be facing Stanford, another bracket busting team, in Memphis on Thursday. We’re hoping they can continue their dancing in the next two weeks!

We are looking forward to the next few years as we continue to learn and benefit from and celebrate with UD’s President, Faculty, Staff and students.

While funny, is it too far from the truth? Perhaps “Skinny Cow Handling” can be translated as “Lean Practices”.

Back in September, 2011, I wrote about a man who I met at the Clinic while I was doing Patient Experience rounding. I shared our discussions about the “Lean Practices” he was applying in his work as a consultant to dairy farmers. I found the work that he was doing fascinating and we established a friendship.

Well, I am happy to share more with you. Jeff Weisel, CEO of Chosen Acres Consulting, Inc. has produced a video that demonstrates a little of what he does, but more importantly highlights what his customers have to say about the products and services that he offers.

I’ve been serving as an adviser to Jeff for the past few years, helping him to present his services as an overall operating system that serves the dairy farmer, their cows and the “plow to plate” value stream.

Jeff and his family have been serving the dairy industry for over 30 years. Jeff’s passion and concern for cows has led him to some remarkable discoveries that has not only made life better for dairy cows, but has also produced higher quality milk, higher productivity per cow, higher pregnancy rates for herds, and lower costs for the dairy farmer.

What first attracted my attention the work the Jeff is doing was his business card. The message on his card was “In Pursuit of Parlor Perfection.”

His work with “flipping” milking parlors was straight out of a lean transformation text-book. Jeff starts with an assessment of the farm to identify opportunities for improvement. Since the milking parlor represents the quickest return on investment, Jeff works with the farmer to plan a “flip” or in lean terms, a week-long kaizen or rapid improvement event , where complex equipment is torn out and replaced with simpler equipment that the farmer can fix himself, if necessary. Jeff provides instructions for the milkers and helps to install a new management system. With quick financial gains from the “flip”, farmers are then able to work with Jeff’s assessment to improve other aspects of their organization – from feed and water, to bedding to waste recycling.

I had the opportunity to visit one of the farms Jeff was preparing to flip, and then to come back to observe the results of the flip and to talk with the dairy farmer. The transformation was startling. Not only were the cows producing more milk, it was a higher quality of milk, the use of antibiotics had decreased and the use of bovine growth hormones was eliminated. The farmer was very pleased with the results.

Jeff showed me all around the farm and talked about the assessment tool that he uses to assess the farm’s current state and what it will take to reach the next level. It was like going on a Shingo site assessment. Jeff not only looks at the parlor, but he looks at the entire organization. The water and feed supply – critical inputs to the process of making milk. He looks at the bedding stalls, where he says you should see cows laying comfortably, chewing their cud which is when they are making milk. If the cow is uncomfortable, she will produce less milk. Lameness, a condition that affects the hoofs of cows causing extreme pain ,is also a major contributor to lower milk production. Farmers looking to increase efficiency have actually contributed to the poor health of their herds and the lower quality products. In the lean community, there is a term used to describe the mis-understanding of lean. The term, coined by Mark Graban is LAME. Lean As Misguidedly Executed. In the dairy industry, lame is a real condition that negatively affects the health of the herd and the strength of the farm.

Jeff’s work concentrates on the milking parlor, since that is the primary source of disease. Mastitis is an infection of the mammary glands, caused by the cow’s environment. It causes the cow extreme pain. The infection causes an increase in somatic cells to fight the disease. These somatic cells get passed through the milk supply, leading to poor quality milk. The treatment for this disease is through the use of antibiotics which, despite great lengths to contain, eventually get passed on for human consumption in the milk supply. As a result of mastitis and lameness, milk production can decrease, leading to the introduction of bovine growth hormones intended to increase production. These hormones also get passed along in the milk supply.

Jeff research and practice over the past 20 some years has led him to focus on eliminating the cause of mastitis and lameness. His work is reminiscent of the work being done in healthcare to eliminate the causes of Hospital Acquired Infections. Jeff recognizes that current farming practices, incorporated in the name of efficiency, are actually contributing to the problems facing the dairy industry. Jeff’s focus on the health of the cow has led to great results for the dairy herds and their farmers.

His biggest problem to date? Getting farmers to change their thinking to adapt his practices that go against what they’ve been taught by universities, pharmaceutical companies, veterinarians and equipment manufacturers. It is very reminiscent of the healthcare industry.

I’ve been impressed with Jeff’s work and am happy to share it with others. Jeff and I will be co-presenting at the upcoming Shingo Conference in Sandusky, OH on May 7th. I hope you can all come to hear Jeff’s story as well as the other great presentations on the agenda.

We are also working on arranging a site visit as part of the Shingo agenda for Friday, May 9th to the local dairy farm where I first observed Jeff’s work.

Could the humble cow actually be the start of the Healthcare Value Stream?

Let me know if you will be attending the Shingo Conference. I’d love to see you.

Some things need to be seen to be believed, while others need to be believed before they can be seen.

During the planning sessions for our recent Continuous Improvement in Healthcare Conference at the Cleveland Clinic, we were discussing the logistics of our optional Gemba day visit for our guests.

Earlier this year, we hosted approximately 50 people from member organizations in the Healthcare Value Network during a Gemba visit. We selected six sites to visit, broke the larger group into 6 smaller groups and established a golf tournament “shotgun” start process that had each group starting at a different location, then rotating counterclockwise through the series of 6 locations throughout the day. We even added a visit to one of our regional hospitals one week prior to the event, requiring a 30 minute shuttle drive.

The day came off without a hitch and the best words I heard all day were from a participant who said “We haven’t seen any of the other groups!”. To me, that indicated success, because we designed the process to keep the groups apart. If they had seen each other, it would have meant that our Gemba guides or host locations had not met their takt time. Everyone had a full day and made it back to where they belonged at the end of the day. We received very positive feedback on the planning and logistics.

So when we started to plan the Gemba visit for our recent Conference, everyone wanted to use the same process. Why mess with success? However, things were different this time. Instead of a full day, we only had a half day. We also were planning on hosting up to 72 people vs. 50. One other big difference, we were asking people to pay to see our sites, while the HVN Gemba visit represented an obligation on our part to share with other member organizations. As a result, we needed to ensure that the visit was value-added.

Since we only had time for 3 site visits, planning team members suggested we establish 3 routes and force participants to choose a pre-determined set of sites. None of us felt qualified enough to guess on how to group 3 sites together to satisfy everyone. So how to manage the logistics of such a visit? Additional constraints included keeping the group size to below 12 participants, while offering enough locations to accommodate up to 72 people.

We choose a “FedEx” hub and spoke process. Participants would be given their choice of 3 of the 6 available sites and rather than rotating people from site to site, we would gather in a central location, send people out to their sites, then bring them back to the central location, shuffle, then go back out.

Participants received a name tag with their color-coded choices for their 3 gemba sites. We posted color-coded Gemba signs in the Gemba central hub location and when every group had returned to the central hub, we asked everyone to “shuffle” for their next site. Gemba guides also had color-coded name tags to help with the proper identification of the location of the tour.

As we gathered at the start of the day, everyone was anxious to see how the “Gemba Shuffle” would work. Participants signed in, received their name badges and we gathered in a conference room to explain the logistics of the day. Once we explained the process, everyone went to the hallway to find their group for their first gemba stop. Gemba guides were given a list of people scheduled for each time slot and checked off participants as they gathered. Once they accounted for everyone, the gemba guides set forth on their journey while we sat back and awaited to see if everyone returned on time. As the first groups started to return, our focus shifted to seeing if the “shuffle” would occur without a hitch. While attendees were waiting for their next trip, we provided “posters” of improvement projects that our CI group had worked on throughout the year to showcase some of our work. Attendees found the posters an interesting distraction while waiting. At the appointed time, I made an announcement that it was time to “shuffle” and report to their next Gemba station. People moved, assembled at the right location and went off to visit their second site. The process repeated one more time and everyone ended up seeing what they wanted to see and no one was lost.

It worked!

Benchmarking is necessary sometimes in order for people to see a process work before they believe that it will. Other times, proper planning and thinking through a process are required before the end results can be seen. The key is to not blindly try to replicate a successful tool or system, rather, understand the problem that the tool or system is trying to solve, then adapt, don’t adopt to your current problem.

Earlier this month, the Cleveland Clinic hosted our first Continuous Improvement in Healthcare conference. What fun we had while learning. We were very pleased with the results for a first year conference, and have many people to thank for our success.

There are many components that need to come together for a conference to succeed. The speakers of course make a huge difference. Ours were some of the best…John Shook, Dr. Patricia Gabow and Alice Lee, along with our own Dr. Lisa Yerian and Darryl Greene.

Our Gemba day worked just as planned when we hosted over 50 people at 6 different sites and allowed participants the opportunity to choose which 3 of the 6 locations they wanted to visit. Using a hub and spoke process, we effectively sent people out to the Gemba, brought them back to a central location, shuffled and then sent them out to their next location.

Gemba central

Emergency Department

All of the success couldn’t have occurred without the support of our sponsors and exhibitors. Their participation and their financial support enabled us to offer the conference at an affordable price for participants and for us to break even financially.

A special thank-you is necessary for GBMP (Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership). They were the first to step up to be an exhibitor and without their initial commitment to our conference, we may not have been able to move forward. So a big thank you to my friends Bruce Hamilton and Pat Wardwell and the rest of the GBMP team for your support.

I’ve previously shared some of my story from my time at Ford and how I learned about Lean manufacturing through the development of the Cleveland Production System and eventually serving as a Ford Production System coach for the Powertrain division.

In 1997, following Cleveland Engine Plant 2’s successful challenge for what was then called the Shingo Prize for Manufacturing Excellence, I was given the opportunity to move over to Cleveland Engine Plant 1 to help them implement the Ford Production System and transition to a team-based organization structure.

There were a few challenges associated with this.

First, the overall environment at the plant was not real conducive to change. They had recently shut down one engine line (4.9L), while the remaining engine line (5.0L) had just lost 50% of its production volume.

The transition to a team-based structure was set to take place in a plant where the employees working there had decided that they didn’t want to transfer to CEP 2 when it opened several years earlier with a team-based approach. CEP 1 Employees were comfortable with their seniority-based structure where high seniority employees could “bid” on easier jobs, while employees with lesser seniority were stuck in difficult jobs. The only ones who were excited about the job rotation that came with the new contract negotiated with the UAW were the lower seniority employees who would see some relief from their 8 hour days doing the same, difficult job.

Did I mention that the plant was also scheduled to close in three years? This had already been decided at the Corporate level and communicated to the local workforce.

So, together with my UAW counterpart, John Nahornyj, we set out to create a training plan that would eventually accomplish the goal of implementing wall-to-wall teams and achieving what was then called “Checkpoint A” of the Ford Production System.

One of the many things we did was to develop a 3-hour simulation for implementing “lean” principles and tools. The simulation utilized the board game Scrabble to demonstrate the value of teamwork, workplace organization and the way to track a new set of production-based metrics to direct continuous improvement efforts. The simulation, along with a host of other ideas we implemented resulted in the plant turning around its performance and eventually earning a new engine line that kept the plant open.

Several years ago, in response to a post on the Lean.org manufacturing forum about simple 5S simulations, I responded with my story about utilizing Scrabble. The response to my post was overwhelming – over 31,000 views to date with several hundred requests for details about the simulation. It wasn’t quite the same response that Bob Petruska’s Pizza Game received, but it was a notable post in LEI lore. Not being prepared for the response, I struggled to keep up with the correspondence and eventually posted the PowerPoint presentation detailing how to conduct the exercise.

This stopped the requests for the most part, however, I was never really sure if people “got it” and implemented it.

I do know that the exercise works in different countries. I had a student from one of my lean classes take the exercise to China to teach the concepts at one of their suppliers. I also had someone send me a Spanish translation of the exercise. It has been a fun diversion for the past 10 years or so.

The Workshop

Earlier this year, I heard that my friend, Richard Evans was looking for half-day workshops for the up-coming AME Conference in Chicago on October 19th. On a whim, I submitted the required forms for consideration and received confirmation that my workshop was approved and is on the agenda.

So for those of you who may have seen the exercise on Lean.org, or for those of you interested in seeing a fun, engaging and informative workshop on the value of work groups, the magic of workplace organization and the value of using metrics to drive the right Continuous Improvement behaviors, then join me in Chicago. I’m looking forward to seeing you.

In addition to sharing some of the continuous improvement activities that have been taking place at the Clinic, we’ve gathered an all-star line-up of Keynote speakers and other healthcare organizations who are leading the way in transforming healthcare through continuous improvement activities.

Lean practitioners will recognize John’s name. Shook learned about lean management while working for Toyota for nearly 11 years in Japan and the U.S., helping it transfer production, engineering, and management systems from Japan to NUMMI and subsequently to other operations around the world.

As co-author of Learning to See John helped introduce the world to value-stream mapping. John also co-authored Kaizen Express, a bi-lingual manual of the essential concepts and tools of the Toyota Production System. In his latest book Managing to Learn, he describes the A3 management process at the heart of lean management and leadership.

On a personal note, I had the great pleasure of having John as the instructor for my Value Stream Mapping training course over 10 years ago, while working at Ford. What a treat it was to learn from the “guy who wrote the book”. His personal insights on his experience while working for Toyota are an inspiration to anyone in the Continuous Improvement community.

Dr. Patricia Gabow, recently retired CEO of Denver Health. Professor of Medicine, University of Colorado School of Medicine

Dr. Gabow will share her perspective on the role of Leadership in a lean transformation. I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Gabow nearly two years ago when Denver Health earned the Shingo Prize Bronze Medallion for Operational Excellence for their Community Health Services division. Spending time with Dr. Gabow and her leadership team left a lasting impression. Under Dr. Gabow’s leadership and despite strong financial pressures on Denver Health, an inner-city safety net hospital, the Denver Health team improved access, improved quality, raised employee engagement, while lowering costs and remaining financially viable. Her positive attitude is contagious and she will share some of her lessons learned.

Alice will share her journey in transforming Beth Isreal Deaconess. Not satisfied with the great progress made to date, Alice has worked tirelessly to keep moving forward. I first saw Alice speak at the Shingo Prize Annual Conference in 2009 about the initial successes her team had accomplished in reducing wait times and improving patient flow. I met her several years later through our involvement with the Healthcare Value Network’s assessment team. She is an engaging speaker who has a driving desire to continuously improve.

To close out the morning’s keynote addresses, Darryl Greene and Dr. Lisa Yerian will present Cleveland Clinic’s continuous improvement journey to date and our future destination. After six years of successfully introducing and sheparding continuous improvement, Darryl and Dr. Yerian have positioned Cleveland Clinic to move beyond what we call the establishment of our base camp, to accelerating our journey to excellence. Darryl’s thoughtful, deliberate approach to improvement has been infused with Dr. Yerian’s enthusiastic and never-ending desire to learn to create a dynamic leadership duo that will continue to cement Cleveland Clinic’s role as an international leader in healthcare.

And that’s just the first 4 hours!

Panel Discussion

After lunch, the gathering will be treated to a Leadership Panel discussion with John Shook, Dr. Gabow, Alice Lee and Dr. Yerian about IHI’s Triple Aim Initiative. The panel discussion will be hosted by Greg Surtman, Director, Business Development, Corporate College.

Breakout Sessions

The afternoon will feature 15 breakout sessions to provide participants an opportunity to hear and learn directly from practitioners.

In addition to 10 presentations from Cleveland Clinic personnel, the program will include presentations from:

Day 2 of the event will provide an opportunity for participants to choose 3 of 6 Gemba visits to sites on the Cleveland Clinic main campus. Participants will have the opportunity to see U.S. News and World Report‘s leading Heart Center for the past 18 consecutive years; our Pathology and Laboratory Medicine’s new building that used lean principles in its design; our state-of-the-art Supply Distribution Center; our Emergency department that has effectively implemented a split-flow process to improve patient flow; our nursing floors where we have implemented a process to improve patient responsiveness and finally; have the opportunity to participate in a condensed version of the Cleveland Clinic Experience – a 3.5 hour enterprise alignment activity that over 42,000 Cleveland Clinic caregivers around the world have participated in.

It should be a great day and a half. We’re looking forward to seeing you!

The Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME) annual conference will be taking place this October 24-28 in Dallas, TX. This is one of the best conferences of the year when it comes to the quality and quantity of the attendees, presenters, workshops, tours and sponsors. I’ve had the opportunity to attend and present at this conference for 5 of the past 6 years, missing only last year’s event in Baltimore.

In addition to providing attendees a brief overview of the certification program, we will be highlighting how organizations, (such as ThedaCare and Halliburton) are using the program as a capability development tool and how colleges and universities are using the program as an outcome assessment tool for their curriculum.

In addition to this overview, there will be a distinguished panel of lean authorities to address questions about the program.

Ted Stiles, Partner and VP Executive Search at Stiles Associates, LLC, recruits lean talent for organizations and will offer his insights into the direction that lean certification is taking in the job market.

Pat Wardwell, Lean Gold Certified (LGC), is the COO of Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership. She will provide her insights on the value of attaining Lean Gold status and discuss the genesis of the program and how it has evolved into the standard for Lean Certification programs. Pat is a past Chairperson for the Lean Certification Oversight and Appeals Committee.

Ron Oslin, Capital One, is the current Chairman of the Lean Certification Oversight and Appeals Committee. Ron will share how Capital One is using the program to build lean competencies in their leadership team and will also provide insights into the exam question development and review process.

Larry Anderson, LGC, is president of ResourceSyncing and a member of the Shingo Prize Board of Examiners. Larry is also a former Chairman of the Lean Certification Oversight and Appeals Committee. Larry will discuss the portfolio process from both the candidate and peer reviewer perspectives.

Kelly Lacroix, Certification Project Specialist, Society of Manufacturing Engineering. Kelly leads the Lean Certification efforts at SME and coordinates the activities of the Lean Certification Oversight and Appeals Committee. She will be available to answer any questions you may have on the administrative aspects of the certification process.

This promises to be a great discussion of the program. If you are at the conference and would like to learn more about the program, please stop by to ask your questions or offer your insights. Committee members will be available throughout the conference to answer your questions and talk about the benefits of the program.

If you have any questions or comments about the program, please comment below.

I will bring your questions to the panel and report back on their answers.

Welcome Fall! My favorite time of the year brings the memory of the story below that really drives home the essence of the waste of over-processing. It also demonstrates poor alignment around a vision. It also serves as a good lesson on the need for standard work. In fact, there are many lean, life lessons in it.

Just because an idea is new, doesn’t necessarily mean it is better. Vetting a suggestion through the use of a robust (not cumbersome) review process, leads to the implementation of proven and consensed upon changes before changing the current standard and leading to unintended consequences.

New standards, if misaligned with the vision as recounted below, result in process improvement gone wild or a tale of unintended consequences. Enjoy.

thistle, violets, chicory and clover that thrive naturally, so we can grow grass that must be nursed through an annual four-step chemical dependency.

Imagine the conversation The Creator might have with St. Francis about this:

“Frank, you know all about gardens and nature. What in the world is going on down there in the Midwest? What happened to the dandelions, violets, thistle and stuff I started eons ago? I had a perfect, no-maintenance garden plan. Those plants grow in any type of soil, withstand drought and multiply with abandon. The nectar from the long-lasting blossoms attracted butterflies, honey bees and flocks of songbirds. I expected to see a vast garden of colors by now. But all I see are these green rectangles.”

“It’s the tribes that settled there, Lord. The Suburbanites. They started calling your flowers ‘weeds’ and went to great extent to kill them and replace them with grass.”

“Grass? But it’s so boring. It’s not colorful. It doesn’t attract butterflies, birds and bees, only grubs and sod worms. It’s temperamental with temperatures. Do these Suburbanites really want all that grass growing there?”

“Apparently so, Lord. They go to great pains to grow it and keep it green. They begin each spring by fertilizing grass and poisoning any other plant that crops up in the lawn.”

“The spring rains and cool weather probably make grass grow really fast. That must make the Suburbanites happy.”

“Apparently not, Lord. As soon as it grows a little, they cut it – sometimes twice a week.”

“They cut it? Do they then bale it like hay?”

“Not exactly, Lord. Most of them rake it up and put it in bags.”

“They bag it? Why? Is it a cash crop? Do they sell it?”

“No, sir. Just the opposite. They pay to throw it away.”

“Now let me get this straight. They fertilize grass so it will grow. And when it does grow, they cut it off and pay to throw it away?”

“Yes, sir.”

“These Suburbanites must be relieved in the summer when we cut back on the rain and turn up the heat. That surely slows the growth and saves them a lot of work.”

“You aren’t going believe this Lord. When the grass stops growing so fast, they drag out hoses and pay more money to water it so they can continue to mow it and pay to get rid of it.”

“What nonsense! At least they kept some of the trees. That was a sheer stroke of genius, if I do say so myself. The trees grow leaves in the spring to provide beauty and shade in the summer. In the autumn they fall to the ground and form a natural blanket to keep moisture in the soil and protect the trees and bushes. Plus, as they rot, the leaves form compost to enhance the soil. It’s a natural circle of life.”

“You better sit down, Lord. The Suburbanites have drawn a new circle. As soon as the leaves fall, they rake them into great piles and have them hauled away.”

“No! What do they do to protect the shrub and tree roots in the winter and keep the soil moist and loose?”

“After throwing away your leaves, they go out and buy something they call mulch. They haul it home and spread it around in place of the leaves.”

“And where do they get this mulch?”

“They cut down trees and grind them up.”

“Enough! I don’t want to think about this anymore. Saint Catherine, you’re in charge of the arts. What movie have you scheduled for us tonight?”

Today is a special day for many reasons. We are going to my daughter’s house to celebrate my oldest grandson’s 4th birthday. When he was born, I remember thinking that I was not worthy of the title “Papa Pettry”. My grandfather owns that title. My father is called “Papa Johnny” by my children. “”Papa Tim” just doesn’t sound right to me, so just plain “Papa” will have to do. As we celebrate the growth of our next generation, we will also take time to remember the events of September 11, 2001 and the sacrifices and memories of previous generations.

September 11th will forever be a day of remembrance for those of us who watched in horror in 2001 as our world changed in front of us. It forced all of us to question what was important in our lives and served, at least for me and my family, as a point of gathering closer together, seeking comfort in each other.

Papa and Mama Pettry with my brother and me.

My family comes from humble beginnings in the coal country of West Virginia. Both of my grandfathers worked in the coal mines to support their large families. Eight kids in my father’s family, ten in my mother’s. That’s a lot of aunts, uncles and cousins. I’ve been blessed with a large extended family.

Last year, another tragedy occurred in the coal mine where my Grandfather worked. The mine in Montcoal, W.V. exploded taking the lives of 29 miners. It put the town of Montcoal on the global map. This, however, was not the Montcoal that I remembered.

In anticipation of my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary in 2007, I asked my father for the 8 mm videos that he had taken while we were growing up. I was able to convert the films to digital files and then create updated videos of my parents, their families and friends, and my siblings and their families. It was a joy to work on these and I watch them frequently.

Putting music to the raw 8mm videos resulted in a one hour montage of my youth. After the mine explosion, I shared the linked video of my favorite segment on YouTube, to show Montcoal in better times. (click here to see video). It is special because it includes both of my grandfathers and my great-grandmother.

Memories of the struggles that those before us have endured are what keep me moving forward. Their hard work made my life easier. Creating new memories with those who are following me is a joy and I hope that my hard work translates into a better life for them.

Nana and Papa with Nathan and Noah at the circus.

We need to occasionally pause to mourn the loss of our innocence, and we must never let the sacrifices of those who have gone before us go unrecognized or be forgotten. We must also work harder to create and capture new, happy memories for those who are following us.